System of General Education in Cambodia: 6 + + ; years of schooling Primary education (Grades -6): 6 years Lower secondary education (Grades 7-9): years Upper Secondary (Grade 0, and ): years Primary education (Grades -6).. Purpose:.. Purpose: To strengthen basic skills such as reading and writing skills. To get pupils to be aware of and to preserve the value of arts and entertainment. To provide pupils with opportunities to develop their interest and understanding in their traditional culture.. Content areas: In order to achieve these purposes, pupils have to learn such contents of arts as.drawing:.cutting, sticking and folding of paper.songs, Dances and games N Subjects G G G G 4 G G 6 Khmer 4 8 8 Mathematics Science 4 Social studies 6 7 7 8 8 8 Physical Education 6 Special Activities 7 Foreign languages 0 0 0 0 TOTAL 0 0 0 0 0 0
Lower secondary education (Grades 7-9).. Purpose: To educate students the real value of Khmer arts, value of beauty/esthetics To develop in students the skills in doing performance, the interest in doing artistic activities for entertainment, the value of traditional arts To get students to be aware of the value of esthetics. Hence its values must be preserved and entertainment must also be promoted. To provide students with opportunities to develop their creativity and interest in beauty/esthetics and cultural heritage... Content areas: In order to achieve these purposes, pupils have to learn such contents of arts as.drawing.manual work: (Cutting paper, and sticking, folding paper, Waving, and Sculpturing). Songs, Dances 4. Popular games. Poems No Subjects G 7 G 8 G 9 Khmer 6 Mathematics 4 Science Earth Science Physics Chemistry Biology 4 Social studies History Geography Moral-civics Foreign language 6 Physical Education 7 Techno-Home economics 8 Arts Education 9 Special Activities TOTAL 6
Upper Secondary (Grade 0, and ).. Purpose: To get students to be well aware of the basic theories and practice of arts To get students to be well aware of the real value and importance of their own traditional arts. To get students to have creativity, imagination. To get students to be cautious in maintaining a balanced feeling, prepare gestures and sentiments according to each form of arts. To get students to be sensitive to esthetics and visual arts. To educate students to love, protect and develop the national cultural art. To develop in students good attitudes towards the national and international arts... Content areas: In order to achieve these purposes, students have to learn such contents of arts as.drawing;.manual work;. Songs; 4. Dances;. Popular games; 6. Poems No Subjects No. of teaching hours per week Khmer 4 Mathematics Foreign language 4 4 Physics Chemistry 6 Biology 7 Earth Science 8 Moral-civics 9 History. 0 Geography. Technology/Home economics Art education Special activities 4 Physical education TOTAL : 4 subjects: 4 hours
IV. Needs Assessment for Arts Education in Cambodia MoEYS launched and implemented its educational reforms to improve the quality of education since 996 through new curriculum development. But in practice only theoretical aspect has been taught to students. To improve Arts Education in Cambodia, we need to focus on five aspects: i). curriculum development, ii). textbook development, iii). teacher training, iv). developing new teaching and learning materials, and v). strengthening monitoring and assessment. The main difficulty is in most of the schools there is no trained arts teachers. Some teachers who have these skills are asked to teach student some traditional music, national hymn, songs, dances, and performance. From the data collected by the Life Skills Office of the Department of General Secondary Education, the total of teachers of the subjects Arts Education, Home Economics and Technology (wood work, agriculture, craft) around.8% throughout the countries. Among them the majority are home economics teachers. For Arts Education, most of the teaching contents are Khmer traditional musical instruments, songs, dance and poems. In secondary schools arts is a separate subject and is taught by one teacher. Recently, through the school inspection activities, Arts Education has been encouraged and have improved compared with previous years. Some advice has been given to school directors to pay more attention on music, drawing, manual work, songs, dances, and poems. Because of lack of classrooms, students learn only in the morning or the afternoon. Schools have to cut down the teaching hours for some subjects and especially for Arts Education.
V- Recommendation to promote Arts Education in schools in Cambodia Arts Education in schools need to be revised and developed to meet the national goals for Education i.e. to develop fully the talents and capacities of all students. The MoEYS should strengthen the Arts Education as To revise the curriculum for Arts Education To develop textbooks for Arts Education, publish them and ensure that they will reach the schools. To continue to recruit arts teacher for the teacher training institutions. To cooperate with community or other relevant institutions such as the University of Fine Arts, the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, NGOs, IOs especially UNESCO to seek their help in terms of technical and financial resources. To use Information Communication Technology (ICT) for teaching and learning arts in schools. Arts should be compulsory subject in national examinations.